a. The Right of Association

The Constitution and the Labor Code provide for basic worker rights, including the right to organize and the right to strike; however, the Government at times infringed on worker rights. Activist unions came under government pressure for holding unsanctioned demonstrations and marches. The courts dissolved two unions in 1998 for violating laws against unauthorized demonstrations, marches, and rallies.

In December the President signed into law a new Labor Code, effective January 1, 2000. Among many other revisions, the new law provides for individual contracts between an employer and each employee, but allows "optional" collective labor contracts. It also allows unions to represent an employee in labor disputes, but an employee may choose other representation. However, during the year the previous Labor Code remained in force.

Most workers remained members of state-sponsored trade unions established during the Soviet period, when membership was obligatory. At most enterprises, the state-sponsored unions continued to deduct 1 percent of each worker's wage as dues. The state unions under the Communist system were, and for the most part still are, organs of the Government and work with management to enforce labor discipline and to discourage workers from forming or joining independent unions.

The law gives workers the right to join or form unions of their choosing and to stop the automatic dues deductions for the state unions. The Confederation of Free Trade Unions (CFTUK, formerly the Independent Trade Union Center of Kazakhstan) claims membership of about 250,000; however, the actual number of independent trade union members is estimated to be much lower. The state-sponsored Federation of Trade Unions claims 4 million members; however, the figure is regarded as too high. To obtain legal status, an independent union must apply for registration with the local judicial authority at the oblast level and with the Ministry of Justice. Registration is generally lengthy, difficult, and expensive. The decision to register a union appears to be arbitrary, with no published criteria. No unions were registered or denied registration during the year. The two major independent trade union confederations are registered. Judicial authorities and the Ministry of Justice have the authority to cancel a union's registration, as a provincial court did in Kentau in 1998.

The law does not provide mechanisms to protect workers who join independent unions from threats or harassment by enterprise management or state-run unions. Members of independent unions have been dismissed, transferred to lower paying or lower status jobs, threatened, and intimidated. According to independent union leaders, state unions work closely with management to ensure that independent trade union members are the first fired in times of economic downturn.

Unions and individual workers exercised their right to strike during the year, primarily to protest the nonpayment of wages and in an attempt to recover back wages owed to workers. Nonpayment of wages continued to be the priority issue for workers. According to the law, workers may exercise the right to strike only if a labor dispute has not been resolved by means of existing conciliation procedures. In addition the law requires that employers be notified that a strike is to occur no less than 15 days before its commencement. There were numerous strikes throughout the country to protest the nonpayment of wages. In May and June, approximately 60 employees of the Shymkent phosphor plant conducted a 33-day hunger strike over nonpayment of wages. The south Kazakhstan oblast akim authorized strikers to picket in front of his office. One striker reportedly received his full back pay and others received partial payment. The strike ended after 33 days when police removed the strikers. Employees of the Karagandashakhtastroy company in Karaganda reportedly conducted a hunger strike in April to protest nonpayment of their wages.

Two unions dissolved by court order in 1998 for "systematically and flagrantly" violating laws against unauthorized demonstrations, marches, and rallies could not legally reconstitute. The unions represented workers at the Archpolimetal metallurgical plant in Kentau, who had conducted various actions for several years to protest chronic nonpayment of wages. Dissolution of the well-known unions led independent labor leaders to call in 1998 for formation of a new political party to represent workers interests, but no party was created. The leader of one of the Kentau unions reported that he had to leave Kentau because local law enforcement and KNB authorities harassed him and his family. Several candidates representing government-sponsored labor unions were elected in the October parliamentary elections.

As a result of their inability to pay salaries, many enterprises continued to pay wages in scrip rather than in cash, a practice at odds with International Labor Organization Convention 95 on the protection of wages other than in the legal currency without the express consent of the workers. Enterprise directors claimed that the enterprises were not being paid in cash by their traditional trading partners in other parts of the former Soviet Union, which also were experiencing cash flow difficulties as a result of the general economic crisis. The scrip often was not accepted at stores or was accepted only at devalued levels.

Independent unions complain about a provision in the Constitution that forbids the financing of trade unions by foreign legal entities and citizens, foreign states, and international organizations. Since independence in 1991, independent trade unions have received financial assistance from the AFL-CIO'S Free Trade Union Institute (FTUI). Most of this assistance ended in 1996 when funding was reduced and FTUI now provides no funding. Independent trade unions have sought new means of support; some associations of trade unions were able to receive financing from foreign sources by registering as "public organizations" rather than labor unions.

By law unions freely may join federations or confederations and affiliate with international bodies. Most independent trade unions belong to the CFTUK, headquartered in Astana. The Independent Miners Federation of Kazakhstan and the State Miners' Union of Karaganda are members of the Miners' International Federation. Unions belonging to the CFTUK are not members of international federations but are able to maintain contacts with foreign trade union federations.

b. The Right to Organize and Bargain Collectively

There are significant limits on the right to organize and bargain collectively. Collective bargaining rights are not spelled out in the law, although in some instances unions successfully negotiated agreements with management. If a union's demands are not acceptable to management, it may present those demands to an arbitration commission composed of management, union officials, and independent technical experts. Unions routinely appealed to arbitration commissions.

A new labor law passed in November reduced the role of unions by allowing employers the right to negotiate labor contracts with individual employees. Previously, the terms of contracts were set by law and collective bargaining agreements. The new law also gave employers the right to fire an employee without the consent of the employee's union.

There is no legal protection against antiunion discrimination.

There are no export processing zones. Several free economic zones enjoy all the privileges of export processing zones, as well as other tax privileges and abatements, but labor conditions there appear to be no different than elsewhere in the country.

 c. Prohibition of Forced or Compulsory Labor

The Constitution prohibits forced labor except "at the sentence of the court or in the conditions of a state of emergency or martial law," and it is generally not known to occur; however, in the north some persons still were required to provide labor or the use of privately owned equipment with no, or very low, compensation to help gather the annual grain harvest.

The Constitution does not prohibit specifically forced and bonded labor by children, but such practices are not known to occur.

d. Status of Child Labor Practices and Minimum Age for Employment

The minimum age for employment is 16 years. A child under age 16 may work only with the permission of the local administration and the trade union in the enterprise in which the child would work. Such permission rarely is granted. Although the Constitution does not prohibit specifically forced and bonded labor by children, there were no reports of such practices (see Section 6.c.). Abuse of child labor is generally not a problem; however, child labor is used routinely in agricultural areas, especially during harvest season.

e. Acceptable Conditions of Work

In 1997 the Government resumed setting a minimum wage. The minimum monthly wage was approximately $20 (2,680 tenge) during the last quarter of the year. This amount does not provide a decent standard of living for a worker and family and fell far short of the minimum subsistence amount for one person as calculated in 1998 by the Kazakhstan Institute of Nutrition.

The legal maximum workweek is 48 hours, although most enterprises maintained a 40-hour workweek, with at least a 24-hour rest period. The Constitution provides that labor agreements stipulate the length of working time, vacation days, holidays, and paid annual leave for each worker.

Although the Constitution provides for the right to "safe and hygienic working conditions," working and safety conditions in the industrial sector are substandard. Safety consciousness is low. Workers in factories usually do not wear protective clothing, such as goggles and hard hats, and work in conditions of poor visibility and ventilation. Management largely ignores regulations concerning occupational health and safety, which are enforced by the Ministry of Labor and the state-sponsored unions. Workers, including miners, have no legal right to remove themselves from dangerous work situations without jeopardy to continued employment.

f. Trafficking in Persons

The law does not prohibit trafficking in persons. Women's rights groups and the International Organization for Migration report anecdotal evidence of trafficking in women from the country. In May participants in an OSCE Women in Politics workshop in Almaty identified trafficking, along with inequality and the situation of rural women, as issues of critical importance to women in the country. No observers have tried to quantify the extent of trafficking, and the Government has no programs to target trafficking in women.

U.S. Department of State, February 25, 2000